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Government Maths – The Great Educational Balls up -Part 8 (or maybe 27)

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OK, the following was released after a Freedom of Information request.

5. Known to social care[1]
25 of the 90 LAs asked responded (28% response rate).
• Based on the data we have from the 25 LAs, the average (median) proportion of EHE children per LA known to social care is approximately 7%. We estimate there are approximately 3% of children (5-16 years) known to social care [in] maintained schools. [2]
• Within the 25 LAs for which we have data, there were 477 registered home educated children who were currently known to social care.
• On average (median) 7 children per LA are known to social care.
• Extrapolating to the national level (150 LAs), this means around 1350 home educated children are known to social care in some capacity (6.75%).
> [1] Known to social care includes Section 17, 37 or 47 enquiries.
> [2] Using 2005 data (the latest available), these are approximate figures and include disabled children.

This was supplied in response to a query for “…in relation to the statement (by Graham Badman) reported in the media that "Children educated at home are twice as likely to be on social services registers for being at risk of abuse as the rest of the
population" - 'full details of the statistical evidence on which Mr
Badman bases this assertion' .

Let’s get the obvious one dealt with first. 150 X 7 = 1050 not 1350.

Some more points (I’m sure I’ll miss many others)

- These “statistics” relate to children “known to social care” not “at risk of abuse”.

- Median? You really want to use a median here? I haven’t studied much by way of statistics but I smell a rat. And multiplying up to extrapolate an overall proportion? Let’s try that for some sample figures.

Lets say numbers reported were thus from a sample of 7 “LA” responses:

0 0 0 7 7 7 8

Median value, (the middle one) = 7

So if we take that median and extrapolate a number of children across all LAs we have 7 X 7 = 49. So therefore across all the LAa we have extrapolated there are 49 children known to social care. But hold on, if we add them up there are only 29! We just added 20 new cases through our dodgy maths. But imagine if we instead extrapolated from that sample of 7 up to all the LAs in the country. We couldn’t check because we don’t have data from them all. Could the same mistake possibly be made? Raed the quoted stats above again. Trust them?

- What about population size? The assumption has been made that these LAs are representative of the population of all LAs. Is this likely?

- Could there be sample bias? Maybe LAs who feel there is an issue are more likely to respond. Those with no cases don’t bother.

I could go on. But others have done it much better here.

So, do you trust the maths on which Mr Badman has been basing his opinions? Opinions which have been publicised in the press and informed his review, which looks set to lead to far reaching legislation. Nice to know it’s all based on sound stats <cough>.

Powers to enter the family home and interview children alone - The Great Educational Balls up - Part 4

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This is a no-brainer for some local authorities. How can we possibly ensure all children are safe if we can’t see them? How can we possibly ensure the child’s voice is heard if we can’t talk to them?

I think this point of view comes from a misunderstanding of legislation, a misunderstanding of children’s rights, and a misunderstanding of the relationship between the state and individual families.

We have gone from a position where the state only intervenes where it believes something has gone wrong, to one were it doesn’t think it possible to assess if something has gone wrong without investigating every detail of our lives. Some say this is because of the collapse of local communities and families, there is no safety net any more so the state has to play that role. I say the more the state takes that role, the more people expect “they” will do something about, well everything really! This just leads to the collapse of society and family responsibility.

The fact is, it doesn’t work. Social Services clearly struggle to keep up with the issues they have identified. How will trying to find more help? For every legitimate case identified how many thousands of families will have the spotlight of suspicion cast on them? And how much money will be spent casting it? Money that could be spent on things that actually reduce abuse. Things that help communities resolve their own problems.

What is proposed is a system where local authorities will have a right to come and inspect my house (what for exactly? No one has actually said this yet, so they’ll have a new power with no identified purpose) and take my child off to interview them on their own. This will also apply to my friends’ autistic children, to the children who were abused by the teacher of the school they have just been withdrawn from and so on. What will they be asked by these officials? Apparently they are the be the guardian of the child’s human rights (I thought that was my job, clearly I don’t need to bother now) so I guess it will be things like “Would you like to try school”. To those of you with children at school I ask this – when someone takes your child off into a room on their own, asks leading questions, then tops off with “would you rather be at home choosing what you learn and when rather than being in school? You could be on the beach now learning about cliff erosion and swimming in the sea.” how would you feel? And when this answer was used as a way of forcing you to withdraw your child from school against your wishes? Far fetched, it probably is (that way round). But think about how you would feel about having the decision made for you about the best way to raise your child, just based on a loaded question asked behind a closed door. That’s what government plans on subjecting our family to.

Oh, and they’ll be round shortly to check your house is a suitable place to raise a child. They’ll make an appointment in advance. At least for now.

By the way, if you have read this far and started to determine that I am just a raving conspiracy theorist, please stick with it. In the next post I’ll come back to some much more mundane flaws in the plans.

Who's the parent? - The Great Educational Balls up - Part 3

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Alternative title: Nanny knows best

I have mentioned previously that the evidence base for Badman’s recommendations is missing. So what is the driving force behind the proposed legislation? There has been pressure from some LEAs on the government to give them extra powers so the can ensure all children meet the 5 Every Child Matters objectives (I have muttered a bit about ECM here but will post a more detailed analysis another time if I can get through the despair that thinking about it induces). The trouble is this is based on a false assumption, that they have a responsibility to ensure every child meets these aims. Actually they have a responsibility that their services should address these broad goals.

An example of this comes from Birmingham City Council’s response to the Badman review (issued under a Freedom of Information Request here). This is their response to the question “Do you think that home educated children are able to achieve the following five Every Child Matters outcomes? Please let us know why you think that.

c) Enjoy and achieve

Answer: No

It is astonishing that the EHE regulations and guidance were published in direct contradiction of the governments otherwise relentless drive to improve standards of education, training and entry to employment. In short parents are left free to devise any model of education they deem fit to prepare their child for life in their community.

Erm… yes, because that’s what the law says! Instantly we are into an assumption here that parents are fools who don’t know how to look after their children. Without the local authority checking who knows what might happen. Parents might make decisions about their children, and obviously they can’t be trusted to do this.

There is very little that empowers a local authority to act where they suspect a child is receiving a minimal, or dysfunctional education at home.

No, there is plenty of power there. The trouble is if you want to act ultra vires (as suggested above) then you can’t. Because the law will only allow action based on what is set down in, well, the law. Damn nuisance the law, when you’re a local authority who knows what’s best for everyone.

It is quite amazing that we have no measurable standards for local authorities to use to define �efficient full time education�. suitable to age, ability and aptitude�.

Once again, we do. But they are broadly drawn. Have they ever considered there is good reason for them to be broadly drawn? (I may come back to that in a later post)

The current guidelines are contradictory and confusing, such as � "where parents do not want any involvement with the local authority, the LA should not automatically assume that there is a problem which needs investigating. Instead, the LA should take a risk based approach, taking into consideration the individual and community�s circumstances�.

Dear reader, is that confusing? I think what it’s saying is that you should not automatically assume that residents of our fair land should be treated with suspicion just because they don’t want involvement with a public authority on an issue where they feel said public authority has nothing to offer them.

It is more straightforward to deal with the crisis situations, but much more difficult in the many cases where the LA has concerns, but the evidence is �a lack of evidence�, ie little or no information about the educational plans, no evidence of real teaching and learning, and no way of assessing progress being made by the child.

Back to the old issue of “but we can’t assess things that we have no remit to assess”. Is there just a hint of looking at the issue through school-tinted spectacle as well?

Home schooling parents in this LA rarely produce plans, and the guidance suggests they are not essential. Given the minimal requirements placed on home schooling families, the reasonable concerns of the LA may well conflict with parents who may have different aims and priorities for their children.

So, this local authority either haven’t heard of autonomous education and child-led education, don’t understand it, or don’t believe it works (despite research evidence supporting its efficacy). They do have plans – they plan to follow the lead of their children. I know its a very different concept to school based education, or school at home, but LAs have been dealing with elective home education for years, if they wont get to grips with a diversity of approaches then what hope is there? How can we possible expect these people to monitor/inspect home educators? As for the last sentence, I think that’s very telling. The LAs concerns are “reasonable” with the implication that the parents “different aims and priorities” are not. Ponder who’s the parent. A quick aside, I note we slipped into “home schooling” and away from “home educating” for a moment here. Could that be because they want to measure against the way things are done in school? Or maybe it was just a slip. I believe it is Professor Roland Meighan who compared those with a school background trying to assess home education as being like a basketball expert trying to judge a game of tennis….

Why are home educating parents not required to provide even their plans and intentions?

Because the legal duty falls on a parent to provide a suitable education for their child. I am also not required to provide my plans and intentions with regard to feeding and clothing my child. This country has lived on a basic measure of trust in parents to bring up their own children, with society (often via government) intervening only when there are problems. Yes, some children may get “missed” if they are not being watched by “someone” but do we think moving to a position of automatic distrust of all parents is a positive move? Not to mention the number of times we see children who are known to virtually every local government department being continually and systematically abused.

And why are EO parents set as a unique grouping who are not held accountable for the decisions they are making for the educational outcomes of their children?

We aren’t. Parents who send their children to schools that fail them are not held accountable for that decision, the schools are blamed. What I think they mean is why aren’t home educating families subject to the same testing, inspection and standards as schools? Well its simple really. The purpose of all the monitoring of schools is that we as parents, the ones responsible for raising our children, need to be able to make an informed decision as to whether it is safe to send our children to a given school and whether we think our legal and moral duty to provide our children with an education will be fulfilled through sending them there. It is also so government can assess whether it is getting value for money, and to avoid getting itself sued. If the parent makes direct provision then none of this applies.

The absence of clear answers in this guidance leaves many parents able to neglect their children�s education. Further it leaves the LA powerless to safeguard a number of children whose education is being prevented or neglected.

I’d really like to know the basis for this statement. Is it based on the fact that they don’t know about every child? Or is it based on them not being able to apply school rules to home ed? Or are children in their area really not receiving an education? If the latter, then they should take action. They already have the powers.

Essentially what we are seeing is home education viewed as something abhorrent, which perverts the ability of the state to ensure that its standards and values are adhered to by every citizen. We can’t have parents making decisions for their children (or with their children as is more normally the case) without the state checking and approving those decisions. Otherwise we might end up with people thinking contrary to the government’s position.

Besides, the peasants will make all kinds of mistakes, because they are not looking out for the Every Child Matters outcomes. Shall we look at how effective government is at looking after children then?

What’s Wrong With It? - The Great Educational Balls up - Part 2

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The second part in my ongoing analysis of the governments initiative to rush anti home education legislation through parliament. For part one click here.

Some people may respond to home educators complaining about the proposed legislation with a question: “What’s wrong with it?”. That’s an understandable position, but I think it’s the wrong approach. When government proposes new legislation we should in fact be asking “What’s right with it?”. Government should not be about new legislation for the sake of it. New legislation should only be imposed when there is a demonstrable need for it, where the need can be shown to be significant and legislation must be proportionate to that need. Legislation on that basis is part of maintaining a free and democratic society. Legislation not based on these principles is not compatible with freedom, simply existing for the ruling class to exert further control on citizens.

The new legislation on home education being proposed does not meet these criteria. The need for it is poorly identified, the evidence presented is flaky at best, non-existent in the main, made up or misrepresented at worst. It is not clear what the aims of the new legislation are. It has not been adequately demonstrated that the legislation will lead to any benefit. Until this has been established we should not even be getting as far as a consultation. That is why many home educators are not prepared to talk about which bits might be acceptable and which may not. Until the need to change the current situation is identified clearly how can an appropriate mechanism for doing that be established? Show us why legislation needs to change, with a sensible evidence base that you are prepared to disclose, then we’ll talk.

Introdution - The Great Educational Balls up - Part 1

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I have been wondering how on earth to coherently blog about the Badman review and the proposed government legislation announced immediately it was accepted by government. The trouble is, it's tricky to communicate the full enormity of the can of worms this opens, not just for home educators, but for education more broadly, and for the balance between the state and the family in society.

So, I have decided to write a series of blog posts, that will try and make some sense of the issues. So, here's the first one. The intro.

Parents have a legal responsibility to
"cause him to receive efficient full-time education suitable ;
a) to his age, ability, and aptitude, and
b) to any special educational needs he may have,
either by regular attendance at school or otherwise."

This is just one of the many responsibilities we have as parents. Many discharge their responsibilities by sending their child to school (though arguably if the school fails them the parents may be failing in their legal obligations). The "or otherwise" bit allows for things like home education, private tutors etc.

The state has a role to play in protecting children who are not afforded their rights under the law. For instance, the state steps in if a child is beaten by their parents, or starved by them. They also have the power to intervene if it appears a child is not being furnished with an education. The local authority has some serious muscle in this area. After making enquiries of the parent if they are not satisfied they can issue a School Attendance Order, forcing the parents to send their child to a designated school. There is no right of appeal against this.

However, some local authorities have complained that they cannot discharge their duties if a) education is not further defined and b) they cannot see the child/access the "place of education"/know who is home educating in their area at any point in time (if those sound like reasonable requests, keep reading as I publish more, they may appear reasonable on first glance but there are many reasons why they are not). This led government to commission what has become known as the Badman Review.

Alongside the bleating local authorities, a rumour started that home education might be used as a cover for all manner of abuse including servitude and forced marriages. This rumour was put around by organisations including the NSPCC, who unfortunately command a level of respect. They were entirely unfounded - no specific allegations were ever made, and when challenged the NSPCC apologised for their comments. But by that time the wheels were in motion, and the government decided to commission an "Independent Review". I should specify that Independent can be read in several ways. Graham Badman was appointed to oversee the review. He is ex-head of education at Kent County Council. The review panel was made up of representative of various bodies most of whom have close links to government. No home educators or home educated children were represented on the board.

The review reported, and the government instantly accepted its findings and simultaneously launched a consultation on new legislation that will change the way home education works in England. It will also change some basic principles of English Common Law. It will define what Education is in more detail than any government or judge has ever deemed appropriate. It puts in peril our own families system of education. Oh, and it will cost a vast amount of money to implement, but no resources will be provided by central government.
I’ll start to break down the big issues in part two.

Who stole all the freedom?

I was once sat in a doctors surgery, rather bored, waiting for my turn to go and be poked and prodded. As I sat in the half empty room someone came in, picked up a chair and left. No-one batted an eyelid. No-one missed the chair. We were all still sitting comfortably. Then someone else came in and took a chair. Same reaction. It occured to me that they could gradually take the chairs away like that, and no one would care. We would barely notice. Eventually there would be so few chairs left that new people coming in would have nowhere to site. People leaving the chairs to go in to an appointment, but who then needed to come back in and wait a while longer would find there was nowhere left for them to sit. I wonder if people would defend the last few chairs? They may do, but the rest would be long gone. All our freedom had been gradually taken away and we barely noticed, and never resisted. Sorry, I mean chairs. Don't I?

I fought the law

Just finished Dan Kieran's book "I Fought the Law" which I stumbled on in WHSmith at the Port of Dover, having realised I was short of holiday reading. Great book - worrying and liberating at the same time. Think it may be one of those which has an impact on life - not quite sure what/how yet. Will probably write more later, but for now, go and buy a copy - it's worth it (but only if you can afford it. If there's any question, there's always the library).

Who wants to live in a society where children are at risk? I do!

So often we here statements along the lines of "but if one less child dies..." or "if we can stop one child being abused...". Indeed the government cliche of the moment is "Every Child Matters". The trouble is, in a simplistic way I guess most of tend to agree with these sorts of statements. There is a problem in that statement though - the word "simplistic". These are not simple matters, they are complex, and cannot be boiled down to "Every Child Matters - how could you possibly disagree?" The dangers of children being abused or endangered in some form of another need to be weighed against the risk of a meddling nanny state really screwing our kids up, or risk aversion that leaves our children soulless and with no sense of adventure or enquiry.

And please dear reader, do not forget, the state has a history of acting in loco parentis. It is utterly useless at it. So I'll keep looking after my kids, and ask the government to stick to what it's good at. As soon as I find out what that is.

What a state....

I wonder just how much state control/surveillance the average Brit can stand? It appears the country will quite happily swallow almost anything as long as it is dressed up in terms of "protecting" the vulnerable - particularly children. The Government's "Every Child Matters" strategy is a classic. Don't get me wrong, I'm sure there is some good stuff in it, but it takes us yet deeper into being a surveillance society.

Some will think this is scaremongering, and that I'll mention 1984 any minute like all good conspiracy theorists. I shall confess at this point I have never read 1984, though I probably should!

So what is the limit? Where does the state responsibility to protect overrule the individual rights to privacy and non-interference? Would compulsory ID cards be OK? Statutory anti-abuse visits by Social Services? How about CCTV cameras in your house, then at the slightest hint of abuse the police could drop by and arrest you. Think of all the crime that could be avoided. Oh, and we could catch all those nasty terrorists too. How could anyone object? If it saves just one life......